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The Satiating Effect of Pricing: The Influence of Price on Enjoyment over Time

Prices are typically critical to consumption decisions, but can the presence of price impact enjoyment over the course of an experience? We examine the effect of price on consumers' satisfaction over the course of consumption. We find that, compared to when no pricing information is available, the presence of prices accelerates satiation (i.e., enjoyment declines faster). Preliminary evidence suggests price increases satiation by making the experience seem like less of a relaxing break and something to financially monitor. We rule out several alternative explanations for this effect and discuss important implications for marketers and consumer researchers.

Layperson's Abstract:

Price conveys multiple pieces of information to consumers. Although much prior research examines how price affects perceptions of a product’s quality or performance expectations, the role of price in the subsequent enjoyment over time has not been addressed. That is, does the presence of price information influence consumers’ satisfaction over the course of a consumption experience? If so, how? In the present research, we explore how pricing affects enjoyment during repeated consumption. We propose that exposure to a price accelerates a decline in enjoyment of an experience, relative to the absence of a price. Indeed, a series of studies shows that the presence of prices (compared to when prices are not present) leads to faster satiation, (that is, consumers’ enjoyment of consumption declined more quickly).

We designed our research studies using contexts in which consumers could have an actual repeated consumption experience. The contexts examined include listening to music and eating candy. Through a total of seven different studies (three presented in the published paper, others available online), we find a consistent pattern that when consumers are reminded about the price of an experience (song) or product (candies) as they are consuming them over time, they show a faster rate of decline in their enjoyment of the experience. Importantly, this negative effect of pricing emerged only over time rather than at the beginning.

Imagine listening to sound clips from three different songs you generally enjoy 15 times in a row. Much past research, as well as consumers’ everyday experiences, would find that you’d enjoy the 13th, 14th, and 15th rendition less than you enjoyed the 3rd, 4th, and 5th. We frequently face, and expect to face, such declines in enjoyment when we are repeating a largely similar experience. However, our research digs deeper into understanding how to influence how steep of a decline in enjoyment one experiences and the factors that might impact this. For example, would you evaluate the 2nd playing of the song as a 90 (out of 100) on enjoyment, and then the 15th playing as a 60, or perhaps a 30? We found that continual reminders of the price of the experience led to larger decline (say from 90 to 30) than when no price information is present (here, you might go from 90 to 60). The primary reason we suggest that this difference occurs is because it makes an otherwise pleasant consumption experience seem less relaxing.

We also demonstrate the same faster decrease in enjoyment using candies dispensed from a gumball machine. Again, while we expect the 12th small handful of M&M candies to be less enjoyable than the 1st or 2nd, we again found that this decrease in enjoyment was much more pronounced when participants had to insert money into the machines to get the candy versus when they just turned the lever and the candy came out (and, it wasn’t even their money!).

One could certainly argue that from a perspective of curbing overconsumption of junk food, our findings suggest making the price more salient might be helpful. However, in general, consumers and marketers alike fight the effects of decreasing enjoyment in keeping consumers engaged with their products and experiences. Our work suggests that separating price from the experience could help both consumers (through more extended enjoyment of what they choose to consume) and firms (through preventing consumer burn-out and switching away from the firm’s products). Overall, making price a less salient component of an ongoing experience may serve as a way to prevent faster declines in enjoyment.